Ipecac, which is dried rhizome of Cephaelis ipecacuanha (Brot.) A. Rich or Cephaelis acuminate Karsten of Rubiaceae plants is a medicinal material imported from Brazil, Costa Rica or India and is recorded in United States Pharmacopeia, Japanese Pharmacopoeia and European Pharmacopoeia. Researches on modern pharmacology indicated that ipecac has effects of relieving cough and reducing sputum, inducing vomiting, resisting amoebiasis and the like. There are certain researches which showed that the main pharmacologically active ingredients of ipecac are chemical ingredients like alkaloids. Among them, emetine and cephaeline are dominant, which account for more than 90% of the total alkaloids. As emetine and cephaeline are free and unstable, hydrochlorides of them are usually used for treatment in clinical practice. Emetine hydrochloride is usually used to treat acute amoebiasis, and cephaeline hydrochloride is mainly used to induce vomiting and reduce sputum. Among total alkaloids of ipecac, there is still another alkaloid having an English name AIDS031406, with a CAS number of 15401-60-2 and a chemical formula of C27H35NO12, and it has no Chinese name yet. There is little research about it in China and abroad, and at present, there is only a commercially available product with a trade name of Ipecoside for laboratory content determination, control tests and pharmacological tests.
Although various alkaloids of ipecac, such as emetine and cephaeline, are structurally similar to each other, they are significantly different in absorption, distribution, metabolization and excretion in a human body and the alkaloids are, in a certain extent, different in pharmacology, too. In order to make drug use safer and more accurate, it is necessary to separate, purify and refine various alkaloids in the ipecac. However, as ipecac is an imported medicinal material, there is very little research about it in China, and correspondingly there are few documents regarding methods for extracting, separating and refining alkaloids from ipecac. A few foreign documents describe researched methods for extracting and separating emetine, cephaeline and AIDS031406 in ipecac. Patent CN102633793A discloses a preparation method for extracting and separating emetine hydrochloride and cephaeline hydrochloride from ipecac, which is performed through the steps of ultrasonic extraction, concentration, extraction separation and purification, and freeze drying. The method is able to obtain emetine hydrochloride and cephaeline hydrochloride with a purity of more than 98%. However, this preparation method is a semi-preparation method, in which the employed reagents and equipment are all used for laboratory analyses. The method has a low yield and output, restricting its use to laboratory studies and rendering it unsuitable for use in industrial production. In addition, a diethyl ether reagent is used during an extraction process. Diethyl ether is an anesthetic reagent which is highly volatile, and its use and dosage is under strict control. Thus, it cannot be applied to production at all.